Sieges keep repeating, and my armies get slaughtered.

[unmerged(217667)]

I tried playing the Byzantime empire today, and ran into some issues I have questions with.

1. The turks invaded, and started sieging a province. The settlement might contain 110 soldiers, while the turks had 8000. The siege bar would appear and my settlements green bar turned to red. DEFEAT popped up, and there were no survivors. I thought this was the end of it, but no, the "siege bar" went green again. And I had another 100 or so soldiers in the settlement. And again, DEFEAT appeared. This happened again, and again, and again. Somehow soldiers just kept appearing at the province, and the battle just repeated over and over.

2. I sent a large army of 6000 men against the turks 8000. I thought this would be a close fight. Well, my army enters the province and were instantly slaughtered, while the turks lost maybe 1000.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

 

[Vox Imperatoris]

1. You know that in CKII, there are baronies, and that each one has to be sieged separately? This is probably what is happening. Look at the diagonal lines that indicate enemy control of a province on the map. If they are dotted, they have not fully taken control of it.

2. Check your relative army leaders' skills. Also, mercenaries start with 0 morale, so make sure they are not newly recruited mercenaries when you send them into battle.

 

[Swuboo]

You have to besiege each holding in a province separately, one at a time. That's what the Turks are doing to you; taking the capital, and then the other holdings. Remember that each holding is tracked separately; there's nothing that prevents both you and the Turks from holding castles in the same province at the same time. As an example, look at Benevento in Italy. The Pope owns a castle there, even though he doesn't own the province as a whole.

As for your army, did you perhaps have freshly hired mercs in it? They start at zero morale when they're hired, so they need a few weeks to pull themselves together before they're any good in a fight.

 

[unmerged(217667)]

Thanks for the responses! That totally explains the repeating sieges. And no, I didn't hire and mercs. Just fresh realm levies.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

Muslims have a huge tech advantage during the early game, so their armies are superior to christian ones.
You will need roughly a 1.25 : 1 ratio for an equal fight.

 

[Selicate]

Also, province terrain can give bonuses to defending armies. If for example you were crossing a river or going into mountains while attacking, the Turks would have received an advantage. There is a small blue orb icon with a green plus under the number of troops on the map during battles if a bonus is applied, you can see what the specific percentages are by hovering your cursor over it.

 

[MasterofMagic]

Muslims have a huge tech advantage during the early game, so their armies are superior to christian ones.
You will need roughly a 1.25 : 1 ratio for an equal fight.

Wow that's a lot less than CK1 where they had like a 2.0 to 2.5 advantage in the early game. I think that's why you saw a lot of muslim factions higher up in the north like Sweden and Norway. lol